I should be revising for a philosophy exam I've got based around On Liberty (Mill) tomorrow. It counts towards my future. But you know what? I don't really care. I'm sure I'll get the grades to go to university, I've revised enough for that, but nothing more. I'm only young but I feel sick, sick of the society we live in. Sound familiar? It's a common spiel you hear these days and I ascribe it to the death throes of global market capitalism. Many of you see the same symptoms, which is why you're here. People are being exploited day in day out, but crucially, it is by a system of which the strings of control are hopelessly entwined. We live in a post-modern condition, relativism abounds and no one group can claim to hold the infallible truth.
With that in mind, how can any of you ascribe yourselves to (broadly) a libertarian/anarchistic persuasion? Or for that matter a platform at all.
We must free the money to free the people, yet we must also free the ideas to free the people.People must realise that in coming here, the development of bitcoins and the rise of anti-globalisation movements are all examples of the human state reacting to other elements of the human state, being pragmatic and doing what is best under the circumstances. In each example people may claim otherwise, but we ultimately live in a position where we consider ourselves to have free will, yet everywhere we are in chains (Rousseau). These chains have typically been the burden of society, but I want to extend this definition to the notion each and every one of our actions are dependent or reliant on another. When I mean another, I mean anything in our tunnel-reality (from the feelings of another human, to an animal to the state of your PC's HDD). Thus, we have not free will, rather the image of it. For instance, I'm only writing this because clicking on 'Politics and Society' I don't see a forum that is an exchange of collective progressive positive ideas, rather debates amongst different ideological camps. I had no idea I was going to write this post earlier, after all and what's more I'm sorry, but isn't the petty squabbling of ideology one of the core reasons why our politicians have FAILED to stymie the rise of corrupt capitalism?
Jump now to twenty years down the line and governments have succeeded to the power of bitcoins, because they cannot be constrained. Where do we go from there? There are supranational issues such as that of the climate that have to be addressed, and I fear belief in small government is a rocky road to well, the earth being a scorched rock. This is an example of ideology being used to harm not only Us but well, Everything we know. Supranational issues are a particular concern, and I'm very interested in what you have to say about them.
That was a digression, my main point I want to raise is that of the Hive Mind, the collective unconscious, the noosphere, whatever you want to call it. The powers that be are already aware of it's very real existence
(http://noosphere.princeton.edu/). Bitcoins are one element of it, you are another element and so on. It is essentially the human 'take' of the only true fact we know, the inter-connectedness of Everything.
If it exists, you ask, what are the implications?
There are no implications, aside from what you yourself know. If people come to realise the only 'truth' in the true sense of the word can come from themselves, through development of themselves they are adding to the noosphere. The only question is,
are you going to add to it for the good of humanity or are you going to make a quick buck off of Bitcoins and carry on propping up an essentially contradictory oppressive system?tl;dr
Society is constantly being oppressed. Everything we do affects each other (The Noosphere) and we should be careful acting in our own self-interest because it could somehow deny other people happiness. Are you going to use your Bitcoins how you like or are you going to use it for 'my' (your) idea of a common good?
